Tatra Ridge
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The story

Losing clients cost one company its sale. Then keeping them helped it sell twice.

Rich Ziolkowski, Founder

30%
of clients cancelled each year
50%
of new clients didn't sign a second contract
10%
net growth a year after, and two sales in five years

The owners had spent seven years building the company. Then they watched a deal to sell it fall apart because too many clients were leaving.

30% of clients cancelled each year. Nearly 50% of new clients did not sign a second contract.

I turned that from the company's biggest risk into one of its strengths.

The change that mattered most wasn't a system or a tool. We stopped pitching our clients and started listening to them. Everything else flowed from that.

Before, sales had to run hard just to make up for the clients walking out.

After, the clients who stayed were what drove the growth: 10% net growth a year, every year. The losses had turned into gains. Two strategic acquirers noticed, and the company sold twice in five years.
Rich Ziolkowski

Rich Ziolkowski

Founder, Tatra Ridge Group

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About

What Tatra Ridge Group does

Tatra Ridge Group is a client retention and client success consultancy for founders, bootstrapped or institutionally backed. We work with businesses that depend on repeat clients: software, data and professional services; agencies and firms on contract or retainer; subscriptions and memberships. The work is fractional and hands-on, what the industry calls fractional customer success: a senior head of client success, a few days a week, inside your business. We find where clients are leaving, build the process that keeps them, and help you grow revenue from the clients you already have.

I spent seven years building the client retention function at a fast-growing SaaS company, helping it sell twice over a span of five years. Before that I led North American client support for a global fintech company, and had a stint at an investment advisory firm where I saw firsthand how client success shaped the way buyers priced growth and risk in M&A transactions.